19th HOLE: THE READERS TAKE OVER

BANG! BANG!
Sirs:
California's deer season opened with the usual oddities. One hunter used a 30-30 rifle as a cane in jumping across a creek. He fell, the gun discharged and the bullet struck his pocket, splintering a pocketknife and other assorted articles. Bits of metal penetrated his skin.

Eight hundred or more hunters sallied into the Chews Ridge district. But some of them spent the night before the season opened practicing, and deer in the region took the hint. Only 10 hunters returned with a buck.

At a checking station set up by game wardens in Los Angeles County, a hunter hurriedly tried to unload his rifle. It discharged and blasted a hole in one of his new white sidewall tires. On top of that, the poor soul was cited for illegally transporting a loaded gun.
TOM ARDEN
Sacramento, Calif.

TOMMY'S TESTS
Sirs:
I'm not sure just what I expected. I've waited to see the next few issues. I have just received #3 and I am sold. Your stories have something new. They go deeper and have new twists.

I am a track coach and the stories of the "Miracle Mile" and its participants were great. Especially so because of their educational angles. If you can always include the latter in your sport stories, you'll do more for sport as a whole than anything that has been published before. We coaches are always looking for new angles to try on our boys, so when they come as you have presented them in your magazine they are very easy to take.

In regards to Tommy Cureton's 18 tests of fitness, I think, according to test #17, that he could have been a better runner than the swimmer he was when I knew him at Yale. Do you realize that, if he just took a five-foot step, he would do a mile in less than five seconds? That really is jet speed. What?

Of course I know that should read "180 steps per minute." Besides you have already caught the mistake...
E. J. THOMSON
Track Coach
U.S. Naval Academy
Annapolis, Md.

•Yes, the error was caught and not a min. too soon.
—ED.

IDEA CHART
Sirs:
...I really enjoyed your coverage of the Saratoga yearling sales and the Marciano-Charles fight pictures. Here is a chart and some, ideas for football coverage:
WILLAM A. COLON JR.
New York

•See Publisher's letter for SI's football schedule.
—ED.

SKATER'S GOAL
Sirs:
...You have let me and 2,000,000 other people every night of the week, who populate our roller skating rinks all over the country down. At Monmouth Garden in Denver, Colorado the earlier part of the month were young men and women from all 48 states, Canada and England who competed in the National championships of the Roller Skating Rink Operators of America (RSROA), which is the ultimate goal of every skater who ever put on a pair of skates more than one or two nights a week, and that figure, gentlemen, runs as high as 3 or 4,000,000 all over the country. These men and women, ranging in age from 3 or 4 years old all the way to men and women in their 30s and 40s, who practice three and four hours every day for sometimes as long as six months before state competition ever takes place. Only those contestants placing 1st, 2nd or 3rd ever go on to regional competition (of which there are seven regions); a month to six weeks later the contestants who place 1st, 2nd and 3rd may then go on to nationals, and just to skate before the thousands of people who witness this great spectacle, which will last from seven to 10 days, is in itself a thrill that may come only once in a lifetime as the entrants pay all expenses themselves, being strictly amateur.

I hope to see something on skating in the future but will continue to enjoy your magazine...
RICHARD D. FOLEY JR.
Auburndale, Mass.

WAUGOSHANCE POINT?
Sirs:
I have enjoyed the first three issues. However, I would like to know what Ed Zern has against Michigan fishing? In vain do I look for a report in The Fisherman's Calendar.

The editors may not be aware that the state of Michigan leads the nation in sale of fishing licenses year after year. So please give us a break and let us know how the browns are doing in the Manistee and Au Sable. Are the bass biting at Waugoshance Point?
WALTER J. RUSSELL
Grand Rapids, Mich.

•Mr. Zern has been alerted. See Fisherman's Calendar.
—ED.

SPORT DANCING
Sirs:
I was very much disappointed...not to find even one small mention of square dancing or folk dancing. Why was this omitted? Isn't dancing termed a sport? At least it takes a good sport to be a good dancer. Dancing should definitely have its place among the sports columns in all papers and magazines...If you don't believe that square dancers are happy people, you should have been with us in Dallas, Texas at the Third National Square Dance convention last April. It was estimated that 100,000 people were there.
ALLEEN B. PACE
Sumter, S.C.

FROZEN MILERS
Sirs:
Would you believe it?

That Landy could trail Bannister by so much, that both could still beat the four-minute mark, yet neither equalled the world's record? We thought you would find this picture of interest, especially as it has not yet been published anywhere.
KELVIN G. HATCH
President
Hatch & Co., Ltd.
Quebec, Canada

BEER & POLO BOYS
Sirs:
Your real customer is the sports fan. You're writing for the yachts and polo-ponies boys. You're talking to the Martini crowd. The real sports fans are beer and pretzel boys and you'll never get us with that sort of thing.
GEORGE BARDMAN
Des Moines, la.

•Maybe it's beer and polo. The picture above was taken at Milwaukee, Wis. last Sunday at the windup of the National Twenty Goal Polo Tournament. Milwaukee, famous for beer and baseball, has been drawing crowds in excess of 5,000 to its Sunday polo matches at Uihlein's Field. Bob Uihlein Jr., a Milwaukee brewer and owner of the field, is on extreme left. The lady is his wife. The others are members of the victorious Texas team. Uihlein's team had been eliminated earlier.
—ED.

BOSCO
Sirs:
...under "Dogs generally considered good with children," I believe you inadvertently left out the Great Dane, or Messrs. J. J. Deutsch and J. J. McCoy have. We had a Great Dane (life span seven years) from the time my younger sister was two years old. He was wonderful with her. The first day we had him, she dragged his dinner away from him while he was eating. My father stood there poised to grab the dog if he should snap—the dog stood motionless and quiet until his pan was returned—then continued eating.

We used to confide in Bosco (that was his name) and he seemed to tell us with his eyes that he understood...
MARY L. PATTISON
Garland, Tex.

LOUISIANA TUG-OF-WAR
Sirs:
...May I comment on the article about fishing for the alligator gar...The method is this: Make a loop of baling wire or some similar flexible wire. Tie with a heavy cord, in the loop, a chunk of overripe meat or fish. Make a float out of a bottle, sealing the cork. Attach the loop and the bottle-float to a length of clothesline, allowing the loop to descend into the water about three or four feet. The gar then sticks his snout through the loop, the float bobs up and down or is pulled down. You yank on the clothesline and a spirited tug-of-war is on until the gar is subdued and brought to the deck or the shore. This technique is used quite extensively in the southeastern marsh country of Louisiana.
EDWARD J. KAMMER
Vice-President, Dean of Faculties
De Paul University
Chicago, Ill.

YANKEE DOODLE IKE
Sirs:
I thought your readers would be interested in this modern American primitive that is painted on the wall of a miniature golf concession at Coney Island.
CAROL L. MERCADO
New York

DIAGRAM

PHOTO

BENNISTER AT THE TAPE, TRILED BY LANDY

TWO PHOTOS